As the NBA’s trade deadline draws nearer, the speculation intensifies, the game of trying to find a trading partner getting harder with each passing minute.

By 3 p.m. Thursday, all the rumours percolating, all the conjecture, real or imagined, will officially be put to rest.

No player wants to read his name in some trade gossip, hear his name talked about when a shootaround is completed and the queries begin.

The ones who are able to block out the noise emerge as the savvy hoopsters, knowing full well this exercise in incessant chatter is completely out of their control.

“I don’t think anybody likes it,” said New Jersey Nets interim head coach and former Raptors assistant P.J. Carlesimo. “If the question is: ‘Do you want to read about yourself being traded or not?’ Everybody is going to say no.

“But it’s one of the things that goes with playing in this league. Very, very few players have not had trade rumours. If you’re picking up the paper and reading about Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, well then you’re pretty much going to read about every player in the league being open to a trade. It’s something you learn to deal with.”

It’s fact of life in the NBA, a reality that becomes more pronounced in the weeks and days, sometimes hours, leading up to the trade deadline, when the June draft rolls around, when July’s free agency kicks in.

J.J. Redick is having a career-low season for an Orlando Magic team that’s going nowhere.

But veteran shooters suddenly become valuable on teams looking to bolster their bench.

As soon as the media was allowed inside Orlando’s shootaround on Tuesday, the inevitable trade gossip was broached to Redick.

“It’s weird,” Redick conceded. “You sometimes get a feeling, like: ‘I’ve got a feeling I’m going to have a good game.’ Whatever it may be. I don’t have a feeling either way on this one (potential trade). If anything, I’m just kind of waiting. But no gut-churning, no nervousness. I’m still going to play basketball, so it’s nothing life or death.”

Nets GM Billy King pretty much summed up the position of many of his peers when reporters asked King about trades.

“Are we going to make a trade? I’m not going to make a trade just to make a trade.”

But trades will happen nonetheless.

It’s just too bad all the noise does not match reality, which is the only certainty in an exercise that has gotten worse every year.

New York Knicks swingman Iman Shumpert began to hear his name in rumours and quickly had a sit down with head coach Mike Woodson.

“He said don’t worry about it,” Shumpert said. “Rumours are rumours. I don’t really care. I just have to play ball. I can’t control that anyway. It’s nothing to worry about. I just have to go out there and play.”

Woodson has been around the league long enough to know that anything can happen, that any player can be had for the right price.

“I don’t think you ever tell a player he’s not going anywhere,” Woodson said. “That’s kind of out of my hands. If the owner came to me and said: ‘Hey, we have to do a deal,’ then you do the deal.”

There are very few owners in today’s NBA who get involved in the daily goings on of a franchise.

In most cases, the GM initiates trade talk.

And don’t ever under-estimate the power of player agents, at times the driving force behind deals.

“I don’t comment on any trade rumours,” Sixers GM Tony DiLeo said. “We talk to every team in the league and we’ll do something if it improves our team. I have no comment on any trade rumours.”

In essence, DiLeo didn’t say anything, but that’s what general managers do when trade talk surfaces.

General managers talk all the time, exchanging ideas and planting seeds in an effort to upgrade their roster.

“It looks unlikely anything will be done, other than possibly some players we will add to our roster,” Celtics GM Danny Ainge said. “Not sure yet of what that will be.

“There’s been a lot of conversation around the league, and we’ve been very busy. Trades are very challenging to make, and then on top of that we like our guys. I like watching this team play, I like the personality of our team. We just need to find a way to give them the best chance to win with the resources we have.”

TRADE CHIPS

A look at some of the names being tossed around in trade talk as Thursday’s deadline draws closer.

Josh Smith

J-Smooth thinks he’s a max player, which smacks of self-delusion, and the Hawks have shown no interest in doling out the coin; athletic bigs with Smith’s perimeter game are rare, but he’s a head case who has yet to grow up.

Monta Ellis

The Ellis-Brandon Jennings backcourt hasn’t panned out and Milwaukee is actually going backward; an explosive scoring guard, but Ellis hasn’t won anything.

Dwight Howard

There’s been no talk of Lakers and Howard coming to a long-term deal, which means a trade is possible as the reeling Lakers make more headlines off the court than on it.

Kevin Garnett

The Big Ticket may agree to a move, especially to the Clippers and especially if L.A. is willing to part with some young assets.

Carlos Boozer

He was linked in a rumoured deal involving Andrea Bargnani.

Paul Millsap

Too many bigs in Utah has raised the spectre of a deal involving either Millsap or Al Jefferson.

Kris Humphries

The Hump’s been bandied about in the rumour mill, but he’s a depth guy at best.

NBA players brace for trade deadline

As the NBA’s trade deadline draws nearer, the speculation intensifies, the game of trying to find a trading partner getting harder with each passing minute.

By 3 p.m. Thursday, all the rumours percolating, all the conjecture, real or imagined, will officially be put to rest.

No player wants to read his name in some trade gossip, hear his name talked about when a shootaround is completed and the queries begin.

The ones who are able to block out the noise emerge as the savvy hoopsters, knowing full well this exercise in incessant chatter is completely out of their control.

“I don’t think anybody likes it,” said New Jersey Nets interim head coach and former Raptors assistant P.J. Carlesimo. “If the question is: ‘Do you want to read about yourself being traded or not?’ Everybody is going to say no.